Happy Jewish New Year,
שנה טובה ומתוקה, and all that good stuff.It's the second day of year 5773 in the Jewish calendar and I think there's no day but today to think about New Year's resolutions. If I fail now, at least I can use these resolutions as a guideline for 2013. And use this blog to hold myself at least vaguely accountable for them.As I see it, there are three spheres of relevance to me when it comes to making resolutions: my work, my self, and my relationships (including friendly, more than friendly--if that ends up happening this year, and family relationships). I'll try to keep these short, straightforward, and concrete.

Work resolutions-Try to meaningfully interact with a new professor, researcher, fellow, etc. in the Harvard or HBS community twice a monthI'm in one of the best academic and professional networks in the world and I need to start taking advantages of the insights and resources within them. -Actually get on a schedule at workIt's been tempting to live and act like a graduate student while working at HBS, but it's led to a lack of focus on my part. I think I need to decide my schedule for the week on Sunday night and determine what days I'm going to go into the office, what I will be working on and for how long (and when to go to the gym so that I am actually making the most of that paid membership!)Self resolutions-Pick one language to learn or re-learn. Ideally, I'd pick up French and relearn Arabic and/or Hebrew, all the while tuning up my Chinese while on the job. But as it is, I need to be realistic. This list of resolutions is already too ambitious. I think I'll learn French, then. -Run a half-marathonThe last time I ran a race like this was my senior year of high school. The plan was to run a marathon during my senior year of college, but that didn't happen--besides, writing my thesis was a marathon in itself. All the same, I'd like to see myself get back into long racing, maybe by running NJ Half-marathon in May 2013. Ultimately, it would be really cool to run the Boston Marathon sometime before I leave Boston (assuming that happens--I know some people who come here and then stay here forever). The extension of this goal is to get into a system in which I can stay in shape for life. -Turn being gluten-free from a boon into a brag-worthy lifestyleI love to cook, and finding out that I had celiac disease was a major blow, from not being able to eat a bowl of pasta at my favorite Italian restaurants to not being able to bake red velvet cupcakes and chocolate-chip cookies for friends. Now I need to get to the point where making dinner for myself or making edibles for others isn't something where I feel like I'm saying "oh, it's gluten-free" like it's a bad thing or somehow depriving the food of deliciousness. Relationship resolutions-Prioritize commitments to people I already knowWhether it's because I'm a people-pleaser or need to work on taking constructive criticism from others, I have a pathological fear of disappointing people .As a result, I go the extra ten miles for others, regardless of whether they deserve it. I need to restrict the love and attention to the people who have earned it, or rather cut off the love and attention from those who haven't.

-Join a social group or two in a community outside of HBS. I really like most of my coworkers, but if I'm really going to have a life in Boston, I need to build a group of people outside of work and extend myself and meet cool people in a new context. Some of the ways I'm considering doing this is by joining a tennis round robin, signing up for a capoeira class, or finding a singing group.